Correct. Seeded the bio balls with established media, dosed a singel time Saturday, two weeks ago today.

No water changes, no re dosing for the entire time so far.

I hung an established Emperor filter pad in the overflow box, didn't touch the new filter, I just put a pad in the drain box of the tank, at about 10-12 days just because I had changed the pad in my other tank.

At 10-12 days, ammonia dropped rapidly to very low levels, .5-.25, then hung for two days. At that time, I tested nitrites for the first time, they were between 2 and 5.

Now, last night, 13 days in, ammonia definately zero, nitrites at about .5, the API kits are sometimes hard to distinguish.

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thats not common,in my experiences, for ammonia to take that long to be converted,especially with established media,there maybe a couple reasons,low temps.,or low ph/kh,even high temps with lack of oxygen
I would dose the tank to no more than 2 ppm ammonia,wait 24 hrs,and verify that ammonia is being converted

Based on what it took to get to 1-2 ppm, I believe my initial dose was high, above 4.0 ppm. I cut the re dose by more than 1/2, and it is still between 1 and 2. I wonder if the intial dose beign too high stalled/slowed it?

Just before dosing, Nitrites were .5. They were between 2 and 5 two days ago.

If you are "cycling" with fish, they are releasing ammonia gradually and not in an instantaneous 1-2 PPM dump (pardon the pun) to the biological system.

That fact that it happens gradually favors the colonization of the bacteria more so than the latter, IMO.

Just speculation on my part - no evidence, scientific study etc, and I could be completely wrong.

My bet is that you are close enough now that once you change some water and get the Amm & Nitrite values to zero - you could add SOME fish. Start with a small bio load and gradually build it up over the next 7-10 days while monitoring the parameters every 24 hrs and adjusting as necessary. All JMO though..

API test kit. I get a shadow of a hint of ammonia from tap water, thinking it's chloramines. This result is darker than that, but no darker than .5 ppm. This tank was most definatley 0.0 yesterday at 8 am, and I have added no water, just ammonia to 1-2 ppm.

the issue I see is that 2 ppm ammonia should have been completely consumed in 24 hrs at this stage,I would be tempted not to add any ammonia until it reads zero,its possible if you tested later today it will be zero

I would dose when ammonia reaches zero,and then wait 24 hrs before testing,if its zero I would dose every 2-3 days,only testing for nitrites,once nitrites are zero,test for nitrates,you will probably find they are high,I like to do small water changes(no more than 25%) on the off days of adding ammonia during the nitrite stage